fundamental instinct of the class from which she had sprung--to keep
oneself unspotted by the world. The variation upon the text is Senhouse's
own, done in a moment of exasperation over her untiring effort to appear
what she was not and did not want to be. She loved the man sincerely; if
she had been married to him she would have kept faithfully to his side.
But she had no lines; her wedding ring was not of his giving. Without
these assurances she simply could not love him. It came to that.

He had, when they had approached the matter of alliance, put aside
marriage, literal marriage, as out of the question. He took it airily for
granted that she agreed with him. The servitude of the woman which it
implied was to him unspeakably wicked. He could not have treated the
vilest woman in such a manner. But he had reckoned without the woman in
her case. To her, freedom to love, without sanction or obligation,
destroyed love. When he found that out, which he did after a year of her
German vexations, he offered himself and his convictions to her. He
humbled himself before her--but by that time she would not. By that time
she had recovered her widow's portion (which had been dependent upon her
remaining sole), and was entitled to some thousands a year and a good
dower-house in Berks. She declined to marry him, and acted as such. She
had been his wife in fact for a quarter of a year; she was his friend--as
he was hers--for the rest of their time abroad. He had respected her wish,
but had kept himself at her free disposal, until now of late, when this
disturbing Sanchia Percival arose out of the nothingless and was shown to
her as a goddess newly from the shades. And so now here sat Mrs. Germain,
with her eccentric friend pale and gaunt before her, unlike himself as she
had always known him, about to take her at her word, and to behave as a
friend might. What should she say?

He would come back if she chose; he had said so--and he was incapable of